Third-down struggles were behind loss, Brian Schottenheimer says

Seahawks offensive coordinator Brian SChottenheimer, right, talks with quarterback Russell Wilson and head coach Pete Carroll during an October game against the Detroit Lions.(Photo: Paul Sancya, AP)

The complaints about the Seahawks' play calling in their playoff loss to Dallas might last as long around here as complaints about the traffic or the weather.

Offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer was asked Thursday on Seattle's KIRO AM what many in the Pacific Northwest have been howling all week: Why did you not use Russell Wilson more after the Cowboys stopped the run in Dallas' 24-22 wild-card win on Jan. 5?

“The biggest issue that we had, and it was kind of the issue that we had all year when we struggled, was third down,” Schottenheimer said on the “Brock and Salk” show. “We weren’t able to convert on third downs. We weren’t able to get momentum going.

“We’re kind of an offense, because we run the ball and we throw the deep-play passes, when you struggle on third down it kind of hurts your ability to get started.”

Going 2-for-13 on third downs hurts any team.

It killed the Seahawks. And their season.

“So, there were certainly things that we wanted to do,” Schottenheimer said. “There were certainly things that we had on the call sheet where I’m like, ‘Golly, I can’t believe I didn’t get that called!’ But it was our inability in converting the third downs.

Of the Seahawks' 13 third downs, Schottenheimer pointed out, "four of them were 10 or more (yards to go). Seven of them were 7 or more. We just got behind the sticks."

Schottenheimer said third down was pivotal all season for his offense, which led the league in rushing at 160 yards per game and scored 428 points, second-most in team history (just 24 behind the 2005 team that reached Seattle’s first Super Bowl).

“That was a theme that when we were playing really well this year we were great on third down,” said Schottenheimer, a 19-year veteran NFL offensive assistant. “That allowed us to sustain drives. Again, you give us extra plays, a Chris Carson is going to break out, a Tyler Lockett is going to get free deep.

“And ultimately, when I look back on the game, that was the biggest issue.”

Converting just 15 percent at Dallas was Seattle’s second-worst performance on third down this past season. The Seahawks went 0-for-10 on Sept. 30 at Arizona, but won that game anyway.

For the season, the Seahawks converted 38.9 percent of their third downs, 17th best in the NFL and worst of the six NFC playoff teams.

Many Seahawks fans blamed Schottenheimer for the third-down struggles against the Cowboys.

Seattle went three-and-out on each of its first three drives in Dallas. On all three possessions, the Seahawks ran on first and second downs, then allowed pressure on Wilson on third down.

That early Cowboys pass rush seemed to discourage coach Pete Carroll and Schottenheimer from calling more pass plays, on any downs.

The Seahawks went three-and-out six times against Dallas. They ran it two out of three plays on four of those quick possessions. Carson, the team’s 1,100-yard rusher in the regular season, ran seven times for 21 yards on those early three-and-out drives.

Schottenheimer called runs 20 times on first and second downs in Saturday’s game. Those rushes gained a total of 58 yards, not even 3 yards per rush. And that includes the 28-yard burst by rookie Rashaad Penny in the third quarter.

How did that happen?

Dallas’ defensive front slanted into run gaps and dominated the line of scrimmage physically. Plus the Cowboys’ linebackers, including impressive rookie Leighton Vander Esch and Jaylon Smith, scraped hard into the run gaps. That often put two defenders in Carson’s run lane.

Carroll also mentioned he over-estimated the readiness of guards D.J. Fluker and J.R. Sweezy, who had both missed extensive practice time and games with injury heading into the playoff.

That’s why Seattle had third-and-13, third-and-6, third-and-7, third-and-17 — and then a third-and-20, after a penalty for unnecessary roughness on Fluker following a Doug Baldwin catch in the fourth quarter.

“You saw us trying to adjust a little bit in that fourth series,” Schottenheimer said on the radio Thursday. “We started slow at Dallas, you saw us try to adjust and come off with the play(-action) pass.”

On that fourth series, early in the second quarter, Wilson threw for 26 yards on play action to tight end Ed Dickson, then for 40 more yards to Lockett to the Cowboys 12 on the next play. Those were Seattle’s initial first downs of the game. Two runs by Carson for 3 total yards and an incomplete pass to Dickson later, the Seahawks settled for a short field goal for their first points.

Yet the Seahawks got to the playoffs by running the ball more often and for more yards than anyone else in the NFL. It’s how the team rallied from an 0-2 start when Schottenheimer and Carroll had Wilson throwing it 73 percent of the time while absorbing a league-high 12 sacks.

The Seahawks lived by the run all season to return to the playoffs for the sixth time in seven years.

They died by it in Dallas.

“We couldn’t have been more committed to being an aggressive football team than we were this year. That meant that we’re playing great defense and we’re working on our (special) teams and running the football,” Carroll said. “And we’re playing off of that. That’s us. That’s how we do it.”

As Carroll pointed out, the same play calls many have been criticizing had Seattle ahead 14-10 at Dallas in the fourth quarter. Then the Seahawks’ defense allowed 121 yards and 14 points.

It’s Schottenheimer who takes Carroll’s system and directives and then calls the individual formations and plays.

In one moment Thursday Schottenheimer said: “We’ve got a way we play. We are a physical football team. We are a run-first football team that plays into our play(-action) pass.”

But in another one he said the Seahawks’ offensive style in 2018 isn’t necessarily how it will be in 2019.

“We are always looking to grow,” Schottenheimer said. “I know more about Russell today. He knows more about me ...

“We are going to go into this offseason with, ‘What more can we add?’...